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Wednesday, 12 March 2014

Red Squirrels at Keilder Forest, Keilder Dam walk

Everyone is sleeping so well here I think because it is so quiet, we all woke up early again which is very rare at home. We had breakfast and a little walk down to the lake where there is a red squirrel hide. We had a quick walk by the lake as it was such a beautiful clear morning, the lake looked so clear-like a mirror, it reminds me of the lake at Bala.

Being goofy for the camera:

Finding ice at the side of the lake, Ruben couldn't resist picking it up

A rare photo of the four pesky hobbits :)

We sat in the squirrel hide for about half an hour it was so quiet and there were so many birds and several red squirrels! Quite rare to see red squirrels in England now and it was only earlier in the year when we stayed at Whinfell Forest in January that we saw our first ever red squirrel so feel really lucky to have now seen several more. They are really beautiful and much smaller than grey squirrels.

These were Cordelia's photographs again:

I love this one

After an early lunch we had a drive around the lake to see the dam wall, within about 2 minutes of leaving the car park Ruben went flying in the mud and ended up bum down :( thankfully it was only a 5 minute drive back to the cabin and a quick change of clothes (a chance to stick the old clothes in the washing machine in the hope all the mud would come out-there was so much of it!) and we were back at the lakeside in less than 20 minutes. This walk was mostly flat thank goodness, as our legs were still feeling achey from yesterdays 9 mile walk. It was still 5 miles altogether though....

The lake was so still again in looked like a mirror:

Couldn't resist a picture of the blue skies and green trees against it:

We walked all the way around the huge dam to the Wave Chamber sculpture, I forgot to take a photo though. It was made up of stones into a beehive kind of shape and when you stood inside (it was very small and a little claustrophobic) and closed the door you could see the reflection of the water through some tiny holes cast shadows on the floor. There was also a photograph of the farmhouse that used to stand on top of the hill over what used to be a valley before it was flooded to form Keilder Dam. We could see crags next to the edge of the water which people used to climb up for views of the valley, have to admit that it made me feel a bit wary as I have a bit of a fear with the children near deep water-no idea where it comes from but it made me feel uneasy being so close to the edge. We stopped for a quick snack though before trekking back of the mini-island which was incredibly muddy but good fun back on to the path and back over the 1 mile dam wall. Back at the cabin and we had a family game of Lord of the Rings risk-Bailey and Ruben beating the rest of us!

2 comments:

we lived in England for five years and the only time we ever saw a red squirrel in the wild was in France:) and in a zoo. We looked everywhere for them. Glad you captured a picture since I know they are struggling to survive along the gray squirrel